Guide to the William Gardner Hale Papers circa 1880-1928

Descriptive Summary

Special Collections Research Center
University of Chicago Library
1100 East 57th Street
Chicago, Illinois 60637 U.S.A.

Abstract:

William Gardner Hale (1849-1928) was a noted classics scholar and professor of Latin at the University of Chicago, best known for his work on the poet Catullus and Latin grammar. He taught Latin first at Cornell 1880-1892 before coming to the University of Chicago, where he held the Chair in Latin 1894-1899. The collection is primarily composed of personal and professional correspondence between William Gardner Hale and his family and colleagues, as well as reprints of his articles published in scholarly journals. The collection also notably contains Hale family memorabilia and other ephemera, mostly photographs, and Hale’s writings and correspondence on the First World War. It spans the years 1880-1928, from his time at Cornell through his professorship at the University of Chicago to his death in 1928.

Information on Use

Access

The collection is open for research.

Citation

When quoting material from
this collection, the preferred citation is: Hale, William Gardner. [Box #, Folder #], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library

Biographical Note

William Gardner Hale (1849-1928) was a noted classical scholar and professor of Latin at the University of Chicago, best known for his work on the poet Catullus and Latin grammar.

Hale was born to a New England family in Savannah, Georgia in 1849. He earned his undergraduate degree at Harvard in 1870 and continued his philosophical education there and in Leipzig and Göttingen, Germany. He taught Latin at Cornell from 1880-1892, and then at the University of Chicago from 1892-1919, upon being recruited by President William Rainey Harper. Hale held the Latin Department Chair from 1894-1899. He was also one of the founders and, for a time, was director (1895-1896) of the American School of Classical Studies at Rome, now the American Academy at Rome.

Hale published many articles and texts on the syntax of Latin but made his life's work the publication of the Catullus Manuscript which he, himself, found in the Vatican. He was also highly involved in developing the pedagogy of Latin, producing two textbooks: Latin Grammar (in collaboration with Carl Darling Buck, 1903), and A First Latin Book (1907). He was highly involved in the Joint Committee on Grammatical Nomenclature, which sought to standardize how Latin grammar was taught in North America and Western Europe. Hale sat on the advisory board of the Loeb Classical Library, which produced translations of classical Greek and Latin texts for a broader, non-academic audience. He was also editor of the journal Classical Review 1885-1907 and became editor of The Classical Quarterly in 1914.

William Gardner Hale was in Europe when Germany invaded Belgium in 1914, cabling in an article to the New York Times in which he called for decisive action against Germany. He advocated a multi-lateral approach to the conflict, arguing that the United States should fight with the Allies on the basis that Germany had broken international law. In May 1916, Hale agreed to serve as an honorary vice president of the American Rights Committee during its Carnegie Hall memorial protest of the Lusitania sinking by a German Navy U-Boat. He donated money to various wartime causes, and corresponded with other intellectuals in Europe and the United States about the war. He was also a member of the New England Anti-Imperialist League, an organization that opposed the American annexation of the Philippines on the basis that it violated the credo of republicanism.

In 1883, Hale married Harriet Knowles Swinburne (1853-1928) of Newport, Rhode Island, a graduate of Vassar College and a proponent of women’s suffrage. Though William and Harriet owned a home in Hyde Park, they also retained a summer home, Aguiden Lodge, in Kineo, Maine and spent a great amount of time on the East Coast. The Hale family was listed in the Social Register and Who’s Who in America, the directories of names and addresses of prominent American families who formed the country’s social elite.

William and Harriet had four children together, all of whom pursued creative endeavors: Swinburne, Margaret, Virginia and Gardner. Swinburne Hale (1884-1937) graduated from Harvard and became a lawyer and socialist activist. He was involved in the Committee of Forty Eight’s Chicago convention, in which they tried to set up a major third party in American politics. He was also an aspiring poet, publishing The Demon’s Notebook in 1923. He was married for ten years to Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale, the stage actress turned feminist author and suffragist, then later, to the heiress Marie Tudor Garland, whom he divorced in 1924. Margaret Hale worked as the business manager for her artist husband, the printmaker Ralph M. Pearson, in New Mexico, with whom she launched a line of greeting cards based on his prints. Their third child, Virginia Hale (1887-1981), became an oil painter in California. The Hales’ youngest son, Gardner Hale (1900-1932), became a well-known mural painter and interior designer on the West coast, reviving the fresco technique in the United States. He was married to the socialite and aspiring actress Dorothy (Donovan) Hale.

William Gardner Hale eventually retired to Stamford, Connecticut in 1920, where he died in 1928.

The Hales’ home on Kimbark Avenue at 58th Street became the Graduate Club, while the second location of their home, 5727 S. University Avenue later became the Department of Music Building and the Statistics-Mathematics Building.

Scope Note

The collection spans the years 1880-1928, from Hale’s time at Cornell through his professorship at the University of Chicago, to his death in 1928. It includes correspondence, legal and financial documents, reprints, typescripts, manuscripts, and photographs. Some of the photograph albums are in fragile condition.

The collection is organized into four series:

Series I: Personal, containing obituaries, clippings, family photographs and other ephemera related to the life of William Gardner Hale.

Subject Headings

INVENTORY

Series I: Personal

This series contains obituaries, clippings, photographs and other ephemera related to the life of William Gardner Hale. It includes photographs of the Hales and their extended family, as well as their summer home, Aguiden Lodge, in Kineo, Maine, and a family trip to Western Europe. It also includes correspondence and clippings related to a 1915 controversy involving Hale’s then-daughter-in-law Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale, a well-known feminist and suffragist, and her twin daughters. This series is organized into three subseries: Subseries 1: Biographical; Subseries 2: Family; and Subseries 3: General

Hale family photograph album, pictures at their summer home in Kineo, Maine and in Chicago, circa 1904

Box 1 Folder 7

Hale family photograph album, pictures at their summer home in Kineo, Maine and in Chicago, undated

Box 1 Folder 8

Hale family photographs album, European travels, circa 1906

Box 1 Folder 9

Margaret Hale’s childhood photo album, circa 1905

Box 1 Folder 10

Unidentified family photographs, undated

Subseries 3: General

Box 2 Folder 1

Address books

Box 2 Folder 2

Financial documents

Box 2 Folder 3

Passport application

Box 2 Folder 4

Questionnaire, National Cyclopedia of American Biography

Series II: Correspondence

This series comprises professional and personal correspondence, circa 1880-1922, including letters from Hale’s family members, notably his wife Harriet, correspondence from other professors and administrators at the University of Chicago, other universities in the United States and abroad, as well as publishers, and other commercial correspondence.

Series III: Professional and Teaching

This series includes Latin examinations given by Hale while a professor at Cornell University, articles written by William Gardner Hale pertaining to his colleagues, the pedagogy of Latin, and academia, legal factums arguing that there were unattributed elements of Hale’s First Latin primer in two other Latin textbooks, and other academic ephemera. This series is organized alphabetically and by date.

University of Aberdeen, correspondence regarding its quarter-centenary celebrations, 1906

Box 10 Folder 24

University of Chicago diplomas, undated

Series IV: Writing

This series primarily contains reprints of articles written by William Gardner Hale for various academic journals, 1891-1914. This series is organized into thre subseries: Subseries 1: Articles and Book Reviews; Subseries 2: Other Writing; and Subseries 3: Publications.

Subseries 1: Articles and Book Reviews

Box 10 Folder 25

Bound volume, Hale: Miscellaneous Writings, circa 1891-1928

Reprint, "William Gardner Hale," by G. L. Henderson, The

Classical Journal, Vol. XXIV, No. 3, December 1928

Reprint, "William Gardner Hale," by Carl Darling Buck, The

University Record, Vol. XIV, No. 4, October 1928

Reprint, "Address at the Laying of the Cornerstone of the Classics Building," The University of Chicago Magazine, Vol. VI, No. 8,